Starting up in New Area - Feedback on marketing plan -

[jasonboudrias]

Hi Sara and Harlan


I am grateful for this site and what you are both doing. It is fabulous.

I stumbled on it a few days ago and my heart is warmed at how you are both

helping everyone with this great information.



You're site came at the perfect time for me. I've decided to start up

teaching again in September. About 6 - 10 classes a week, and renting at

different locations. To get the right price/ the right time of the week.


I'll share with you what I was planning to do to market myself and hope to

get your feedback. I live in a suburb of Toronto, Canada - 30-45

min out of the city in Milton-40,000 people but the fastest growing city in

Canada this year. My plan is to rent my different spaces and teach 1

to 2 nights per week in 2 cities in a 20 min radius of where I live for a total

of 6-8 classes each week in sessions of two back to back classes (3hrs) each day.

Ex: 2 classes/night - Mon and Wed evenings and Sat morning in Milton. In

MiltonThere are 2 other main yoga studios. One specializes in Yoga, the

other Yoga, Pilates, Nia, etc.. They are my main competition. They charge

$13.50 and $14 per class for a pre-registration of 12 weeks.


Thurs Evenings in Georgetown - 40,000 population. Didn't seem to be a Yoga

studio there except someone teaching in their home but doing a fair bit of

advertising.


I may also do Tuesday evenings in a small town of Campbellville 10 min away into the country - It's only a small town of 4000 houses, it's part of - part of milton but there is a lot of wealthy people living in that area, and if I did a direct mail to them announcing I'm bringing Yoga to them, instead of them driving to Milton it might work.

20 min west of me are two larger cities of Mississauga 600,000 and Brampton

400,000 people. But there is a ton of competition in these places.

This is just for background because you may have different suggestions

Harlan & Sara.



MARKETING: Now I need to get out there and market myself now for the

September session to attract students. Time is of the essence. I was

planning to blitz the stores with flyers, perhaps some direct mail, and possibly

some of these:


Other ideas for marketting were:

1. Direct Mail - Postcard Mailout - Targeted to women - making more than $30K, ages 20-59. It cost $.10 each to mail the postcards and about $260 to print 5000.

2. Outdoor Flourescent Signs on the street. $300/for 3 weeks.

3. Newspaper: Fall Registration Section: It costs $600 for 7 ads 3"x3" (one ad is free in that price) or about $120 per ad.

I find all that expensive but I was considering putting a $1000-$1500 as an

advertising budget. I'd like to fill these classes which means it might be 60-

100 students.


I have already posted on Craigslist since 2 days now but haven't gotten any

calls. There is no Craigslist for Milton or Georgetown . Only Toronto so I had

to put it there, with Milton as the location. Do you think the Craigslist

strategy will still be effective for me if I'm outside of Toronto?



Next I need to get some pay per click and my website up and follow your

advice Harlan with a Email Capture page and putting people on an email

autoresponder. I've been working day and night on all this stuff to get things

ready for September. Your website has been great in guiding me and helping

me to know which direction to put my efforts into and how to do it.

Marketing is everything.


Any feedback on the marketing plan or my overall strategy? And what I need

to really focus my efforts on. I'm probably designing flyers and postcards

this weekend cause Septembers around the corner. I'll let you critique them

as well as my Craigslist ad.


Price: What would you suggest I charge - in comparison to the two charging $13.50-$14/class.


Sorry for the long post. I wanted to give you a bit of background since I'm

new. I'm sure some of what's discussed here might be helfpul for others also.

Once again, I extend my gratitude for all you are both doing for everyone.


Warmest regards.

Jason

[Sara]

Jason,

Hi there. Took a few days to get to you but Harlan and I talked a lot about where you are at and what you are trying to accomplish.

First I want to say that you have a fabulous mindset and I love your ambition. I could sense it in the your writing and detail of your e-mail. I love to see when people are so passionate about moving foward and making it happen. So continue to be encouraged and stay on the up and up. Any way we can help push you to the next level we are happy to help. I would suggest that you sign up for our monthly newsletter. There is lots of good information we provide every month that is not on our site.

First let me address your advertising stradegy. I would say go ahead on the direct mail and the flyers. Test those and see the response that you get. Hold off on the Newspaper ads. Do more investigation first. It is a lot of money to spend on an ad. You need to check out the Newspaper and see how many other yoga studios and teachers are running ads. Chances are that if you don't find many then it means it will not be the best place for you to run an ad. About a year ago I ran an ad in a local natural magazine here. The add ran for 2 months and I only recieved one call from someone and got zero clients. I realized it didn't make sense to continue running that ad in that particular magazine.

If you do not yet have a website then get on that. Spend your money on your site unless you are gifted in doing it mostly yourself. Your website is one of you best ways to market yourself. After your site is up you want to work on directing traffic to your site. This is key.

Pricing for you classes can vary. Do not go lower that other studios in the area. You could offer a first time 6 week sign up discount. Or give some incentive so people can check your class out and see if they like it. Be careful to not sell yourself short. Calculate in your gas, studio expenses, and how much you want to be making per student after all that is taken care of.

If you are going to be renting studio space by the hour, talk to the owner of the studio and see how and if they want to help promote your class. If you are going to be bringing in new students then if they get other teachers to talk about your classes you could promote what the studio is doing to your students. Just a thought.

In response to your question about what to give back to chiropractors if they pass out your flyers. Go to them and make a deal. Arrange to give them all the money you make from the first session(if it is a private or a class) only if your client stays with you more that 3 months. If you only see the client a few times them offer to give the massage therapist or chiropractor half of what you make. You will have to think legistically about the deal you want to propose to them but I am sure they will be happy to promote you to their clients if you give them something for the referral.

One major way to get private clients and more people coming to your classes is by referrals. You want to gear your business towards running mostly on referals. make up a flyer, first class free for friends or family members of your students. Continue to ask for referrals. Half or more on your business could eventually be all from referrals. This is mostly how I have grown my private business.

So between your flyers, chiropractors, your website and referrals you are going to be rock'in. Hope this has given you some further direction. Let us know how you are doing.

Courage brings prosperity,
Action leads to results.

Blessings to you on your teaching path,

Om Shanti,
Sara

[lauren]

Hi Jason,

I read your post today and am thrilled to hear what you're doing. I am embarking on the same journey myself and have a very similar plan as yours. I was thinking however, and I haven't seen any posts regarding this, but is it possible to start a small business and have it financed by a bank in order to provide stable income? I was thinking of teaching at various locations like yourself and then creating an online boutique to supplement my income. Have you heard of anybody doing this? Blessings to you, Lauren

[jasonboudrias]

Hi Lauren,

It's great to hear that you're on the same road. Have it financed by a bank? I haven't thought of this, but why not. I guess you mean getting some capital upfront right? Why not? Especially if there are programs that are there to offer funding to start small business. Something to look into.

About the online boutique, that's also a great idea especially if you know how to do that. Personally I don't have experience with that. Not sure I know anyone who's doing that either.

Go forward with your dreams!

All the best to you Lauren.

Kind regards,
Jason

[Administrator]

Wow, you guys have great ideas.

First: here's the bad news.

Banks rarely lend money to service businesses at start up time. They want to see you are making money before lending you money.

Banks like zero risk. So a new business is not attractive to them.

Second: We've pointed our before your Craigslist does not need to be in your specific area.

Third: The Toronto newspapers are very expensive. Most newspaper advertising is too expensive for yoga teachers. Spend the money on your website and pay per click advertising. I just tested "yoga teacher Toronto" and didn't come up with any responses.

So get in there and get going.

Peace.

Harlan

[jasonboudrias]

Hi Harlan,

Thanks for the tip.

For the pay per click, let's say I choose a target area of 10 or 15km radius around where I'll be teaching my classes. Those are the people I want to put pay per click for.

Here's an example ad I was thinking about.

Yoga Classes in Campbellville
15% OFF-1st 15 people only-Act Now
Reduce Stress-Drop Fat-Boost Energy

Suggestions or improvements???

Now when I'm creating this ad, what about the Keywords?
that's where I wasn't sure what to put.

I thought of

Yoga Campbellville
Campbellville Yoga
Yoga Teacher Campbellville

Any other suggestions or changes that would get me calls.

This is totally new to me, and rather than go trial and error on my own, and make a mistake I'd like to ask you your opinion. I know you know this stuff inside out.

Peace,
Jason

[jasonboudrias]

Should I put also? Yoga "in" Campbellville

[Administrator]

Those aren't nearly enough keywords.

I think Sara has about 300-500 keywords for her website.

You are thinking in a linear format and not using the right side of your brain.

You need to get creative here.

Also, read our posts.

Benefits need to come up front.

The benefits go in the top line of your ad not the bottom
as if the benefits are an after thought.

Let's see some more ideas.

Peace.

Harlan